LOS ANGELES -- Saturday night's championship bout between Oscar De La Hoya and Sugar Shane Mosley brought out Hollywood and sports royalty.

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Actors Dustin Hoffman, Will Smith, Sidney Poitier and former heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali were among the 20,000 fans who crowded the downtown Staples Center to watch Mosley outpoint De La Hoya for the WBC welterweight championship.

No jeans or tank tops here, please. The fight crowd went upscale, with most men dressed in suits and women in dresses and high heels.

It was the first major fight in the city since Ali squared off against Ken Norton in 1972. Many believed it was long overdue.

"I love it and it's about high time," said Eric Braedon, star of the TV soap opera "The Young and the Restless."

"L.A. needed this desperately in order to make people aware of the city," he said.

The crowd was sprinkled with sports heroes, including basketball legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant, fresh from the Los Angeles Lakers' loss in Game 5 of the NBA Finals, turned out. So did Mark McGwire, who hit his 24th home run earlier in the day in the St. Louis Cardinals' 4-3 victory over the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Fans hoped that the fight would change the trend of having big-name bouts in Las Vegas, Atlantic City and New York.

"Just look around you," said Darnell Young, 29, of Pomona. "Everybody is smiling and everybody is anxious. This is history in the making."

Young rooted for Mosley, who also is from Pomona.

"This is well deserved, life-fulfilling thing for Shane and even much more for us in Pomona," he said.